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Nancy Grace
Nursing Student Claims Carjacker Suffocated 7-Year-Old Son
Aired September 21, 2007 - 20:00 ET
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
NANCY GRACE, HOST: Tonight, a parent`s worst nightmare. South Carolina, a young mom tells police she is carjacked at knifepoint. She survives, but her 7-year-old baby boy is smothered to death with a pillow already in Mom`s car. No sex assault, no theft. Even with a police sketch, still no arrests tonight as the investigation stretches on.
And we learn, just months before the alleged carjacking, the little boy nearly dies in a house fire, a fire started in his room while mom sleeps in the next room.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Investigators were still looking for clues long before sunrise. Seven-year-old Devon Epps was dead. The mother said a carjacker killed him. The woman says a man threatened her before getting into the front passenger seat, forcing Devon into the back. Devon`s mother told deputies the man forced her to drive around, but at one point, she got out and the man locked the car and killed her son. The child`s mother says she got back into the car and scuffled with the man, who ran off into the woods. She says he was in his 30s or 40s, with reddish hair, about six feet tall and weighed more than 200 pounds. He was wearing a white T-shirt and Jeans at the time. Investigators say they don`t know what would lead a man to force his way into a car and kill a child, but the search goes on for a suspect and answers.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
GRACE: And tonight: A gorgeous young sales rep vanishes in thin air, upscale neighborhood. City? Chicago. Nailah Franklin last sent text messages early that evening en route to dinner, Franklin never heard from again. Police search Franklin`s exclusive neighborhood condo to discover two missing laptop computers. Also gone, credit cards and a 2005 gray Chevy Impala.
Now, how does that fit into the mystery? Did the 28-year-old report telephone threats in the weeks just before she went missing? Tonight: Police comb grainy surveillance video that is emerging in the mystery surrounding 28-year-old Nailah Franklin.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Family, friends and Chicago police are wondering what happened to 28-year-old Nailah Franklin, the successful and beautiful pharmaceutical sales rep missing for days now. Her last form of communication, text messages on Tuesday night indicating she had dinner plans. Then Franklin vanishes.
The search reveals personal items missing from the popular businesswoman`s upscale Chicago condo, including two computers, credit cards and her 2005 Chevy Impala. But tonight, some chilling details emerge. Police reveal Franklin had been getting threatening telephone calls from a man her family and friends believe she once dated.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: I do belief she`s in distress of some sort because she`s not the kind of person who would just leave without a trace.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
GRACE: Good evening. I`m Nancy Grace. I want to thank you for being with us. First, South Carolina and the mystery surrounding the investigation of the asphyxiation of a 7-year-old boy. Only eyewitness? Mom.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Just who is responsible for the death of 7-year- old Devon Epps remains a mystery, the South Carolina elementary student and his mom, Amanda Smith, in her Honda Civic when she claims they were carjacked by a man with a knife. Smith says the surprise passenger forces them to drive into the woods, and it`s there Mom claims the suspect forces her out of the car, locks the door and smothers her son with a pillow.
After smashing through the car window, Smith gets into a struggle with the armed suspect, but he flees into the woods. Police circulate this sketch, but more than one month later, still no arrests. And a stunning report emerges. Little Devon Epps almost died in a house fire just months before the deadly mystery in the woods of Greenville, South Carolina.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
GRACE: Only eyewitness, Mom. No sex assault, no theft. The injuries to the mom have largely been undisclosed, but now we learn there was one non-life-threatening injury to her arm.
I want to go straight out to the reporter there on scene first of all, to Taylor Stone, news director with WLMA radio. Taylor, what happened? And how is the mom?
TAYLOR STONE, 1350 WLMA: Actually, the mom is fine. She was released from the hospital. And hi, Nancy. The homicide investigation is ongoing. The latest count is 60 reported leads on this case right now.
GRACE: Now, I don`t quite understand the mom`s injury.
STONE: Well, apparently, during the scuffle, she had an injury with the -- from the gentleman that she was scuffling with.
GRACE: Out to Jane Velez-Mitchell, investigative reporter and author. You know, it`s my understanding the mom says she was -- first of all, I don`t know why she was out at 10:45 at night, not that that`s a crime, but there`s a 7-year-old child in the car. Don`t they have to go to sleep? Different can of worms.
But she`s at a stop sign on a frontage road near the interstate, and out of nowhere comes a guy whose sketch looks amazingly like her husband, but he happened to be in jail at the time. It couldn`t have been him. He gets into the car, then somehow forces them into a wooded area for no other reason than to smother the baby with a pillow already in Mom`s car? Have I missed something?
JANE VELEZ-MITCHELL, INVESTIGATIVE REPORTER: No, you have it exactly right, Nancy. It doesn`t make a lot of sense on the face of it. A carjacker who, wielding a knife, jumps into the passenger seat, forces the 7-year-old boy to the back seat, says, Go to a wooded area, then forces the mom out, locks the door, proceeded to jump into the back seat and smother the boy with a pillow that just happens to be on hand, and then gets into a scuffle with the mom, who is allegedly throwing rocks at the car to break back in. She gets in, he splits, but he leaves the car. The carjacker leaves the car and the dead boy. And apparently, he doesn`t take anything. And when police arrive, the boy is not inside the car anymore. That lifeless body is outside the car.
GRACE: Out to the lines. Jesse in Texas. Hi, Jesse.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Hi, Nancy.
GRACE: How are you, dear?
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: I`m doing great. How about you?
GRACE: I`m good. What`s your question?
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: My question is, have they given the mother a polygraph test?
GRACE: Excellent question. Back to Taylor Stone. She`s news director at WLMA radio. Taylor, has the mom taken a poly?
STONE: That -- I have yet to be determined on that. I`m trying to find that out. It looks as if they are -- she`s not necessarily a suspect at this point, but they`re not ruling her out, that`s for sure.
GRACE: Well, actually, you`re right. She is not a suspect. They`re not ruling anybody in or out. And so far, no follow-up -- not any follow- up, but no real answers on the leads that have come in. The sketch that the mom gave, the composite sketch, looked like kind of her husband and homeless person in the area. Taylor, do we know, have police talked to this homeless person?
STONE: The homeless person has not been able to be located.
GRACE: I want to go back to the dad. They`re actually not husband and wife. But are we correct, Taylor Stone, that the biological dad was in jail for non-payment of child support at the time? It couldn`t have been him, right?
STONE: That is very true. He was in jail.
GRACE: OK. Back to Jane Velez-Mitchell. Jane Velez, tell me about this fire that happened just, what, two or three months before the carjack.
VELEZ-MITCHELL: Well, this is another very bizarre and suspicious circumstance, frankly, Nancy. About three months before, in early May, there was a fire in Devon`s room, the little boy`s room. He was rushed to the hospital suffering from smoke inhalation.
Now, here`s the amazing thing. This courageous little boy told the story of how he woke up and saw that his room was on fire, and touched the handle of the door and it was very hot. Nevertheless, he proceeded to open the door and race, and where did he race? To save his mama. So he may very well have saved his mother`s life, and now, of course, this little child is dead.
GRACE: Jane, how did the fire start in his room with him asleep?
VELEZ-MITCHELL: Well, it has been, apparently, ruled accidental, although I wouldn`t be surprised if police look into it again and fire officials look into it again. The mother said she left two lights on, one a lamp and one a night-light, before going to sleep. And certainly, one would wonder why you would leave two lights on and then leave a child at the age of 7 alone in a room and go to sleep. But that`s our understanding, at this point.
GRACE: To Tom Shamshak, private investigator, joining us out of Boston jurisdiction. Tom, I prosecuted a lot of arson cases, and do you know how rare it is for a night-light, which is intended to be on all night, or a lamp, to spontaneously burst into flames?
TOM SHAMSHAK, PRIVATE INVESTIGATOR: It is rare, but what -- could they determine the wattage of that particular bulb? Was this something that was intended to start a fire? Were there articles of clothing placed...
GRACE: Wait. Wait. Did I hear you say, Was the light bulb intended to start a fire?
SHAMSHAK: Yes.
GRACE: I don`t even know what you`re talking about. Who am I going to sue, GE for the light bulb...
SHAMSHAK: No, no, no, no, no!
GRACE: ... that was created to start a fire?
SHAMSHAK: No, no. You`re missing the point. Did she get a bulb that was inappropriate and that would intend to start a fire, that the heat generated from it, was it deliberately put in there?
GRACE: Tom, you`re kidding, right? How many times, including me, has everybody in this studio and in this country put the wrong wattage in a lamp? It will blow out before it starts a fire.
SHAMSHAK: Well, you don`t know what time she put it in there.
GRACE: OK. Fine. What about it, Pat Brown?
PAT BROWN, CRIMINAL PROFILER: Well, I`m -- I think it`s the most ridiculous story I`ve ever heard, this carjacking story, and I`m beginning to believe that this woman wanted that son out of her life. She exhibits a lot of the Munchausen syndrome by proxy, where you either make a kid sick to get attention or kill them to get attention. And a lot of those women have nursing backgrounds, and this woman was a nursing student.
I think, yes, it looks like she might have set that fire. Maybe she put the lamp near, like, a curtain so it would accidentally go on fire. The story of...
GRACE: OK, Pat, Pat...
BROWN: Yes?
GRACE: In your life, have been ever had a lamp catch on fire? They didn`t say anything about curtains. They didn`t say anything about papers, newspapers, magazines wadded up. No. They said a night-light and a lamp. Those were the possible sources of a fire that started in the little boy`s room, with his door shut, with Mom in the next room. Again, she is not a suspect. I`m just telling you what the facts are.
BROWN: Well, that may be what they...
GRACE: Do you know anybody whose house burned down because of a night-light?
BROWN: Not from a night-light, but the lamp does concern me and maybe what was around it to make the fire happen.
GRACE: Do you know somebody that...
(CROSSTALK)
BROWN: Yes, I worked on a case, Nancy, that was very similar to that and...
GRACE: And what happened?
BROWN: They never figured out what happened. That was the problem. It started a massive fire and they couldn`t figure it out, so they just...
GRACE: And it was just a lamp? It was just a lamp? There were no newspapers or nothing? The lamp just went up?
BROWN: Well, it depends how bad the fire is, Nancy, how much it had spread and what had disappeared, and therefore maybe the evidence disappeared in the fire. But I`m telling you, this story that the woman`s come up with the carjacking is absolutely ludicrous. It doesn`t make a darn bit of sense. Nobody carjacks somebody and tries to kill the kid, rather than the woman. The woman is the big threat. That`s the one you go after first, not the child. To allow the woman out of the car to call the police and to throw rocks at you while you`re killing off the kid is absolutely the stupidest story I`ve ever heard, so...
(CROSSTALK)
GRACE: ... prosecutor in the Atlanta jurisdiction. Holly, again, the mom -- let me repeat -- has not been named a suspect. Here`s the thing, though. Holly, when you prosecute a case, you look for motive. Not that the state ever has the burden of showing motive, but there`s no sex assault, there`s no theft, and I`ve never seen -- we`re going to go to the shrink in just a moment -- a psychological profile where a carjacker jumps in to smother the little boy, with the murder weapon a pillow already in the car, and then leaves, leaves Mom there, a witness, leaves the car, leaves the pocketbook, leaves everything!
HOLLY HUGHES, PROSECUTOR: Right. Nancy, this story stinks worse than 10-day-old flounder, OK? There`s a million things wrong with it. Pat hit on it mostly. She said, first of all, you know, you`re going to disable the adult first before you go after the child because the adult`s the bigger threat. Secondly, what mother is going to get out of the car and leave her 7-year-old in there to be locked in there with the killer in the first place?
Additionally, if he`s got a knife, Nancy, he brought the knife with him. Why doesn`t he use the knife on the 7-year-old? He smothers it with a pillow that just happens to be in the car? This story did not hold water. I know she hasn`t been named a suspect yet, but I wouldn`t be at all surprised if, down the line, they don`t name her as a person of interest, Nancy.
GRACE: Joining us right now is the aunt of Devon Epps, the little boy who perished in the car that day. To Diane Jacques. Ms. Jacques, thank you for being with us.
DIANE JACQUES, GREAT AUNT OF MURDERED BOY: Thank you.
GRACE: What was your reaction when you learned that little Devon was dead, a 7-year-old boy dead?
JACQUES: Oh, it was hard. It was hard to accept. I didn`t even believe it until I actually seen that he was really gone.
GRACE: Did you talk to the mom?
JACQUES: Just for a brief minute.
GRACE: What did she say?
JACQUES: No emotion. Nothing, really.
GRACE: Did she tell you what happened?
JACQUES: Well, her and my brother had a conversation, and you know, there weren`t a whole lot of words said, you know? And she just more or less told (ph) my brother, you know, some things was left, you know, unsaid, you know?
GRACE: No, I don`t know. What do you mean? She said some things are left unsaid? What did she say to your brother?
JACQUES: That was the exact words that she had told him, that, you know, some things are, you know, are left, you know, better, you know, not known or unsaid, you know, and there was a lot of things that, you know, he -- you know, just him (ph) not to know, you know? And he kept asking her questions, you know, and questions over again. And so she just, you know, told him, you know, to quit asking so many questions.
GRACE: What about the fire? What do you know about that fire?
JACQUES: I was told two different stories, and that made me suspicious of it.
GRACE: Who told you two different stories?
JACQUES: Well, his mom came up with a story to begin with. And then when I had talked to Devon -- because, you know, me and Devon were real close. He was more like a grandson to me than, you know, an aunt. But when I had talked to Devon, you know, he had told me about, you know, him, you know, waking up coughing, and you know, he couldn`t breathe.
And he was trying to find his way into the -- you know, to get out. And he kept trying to go to the door, you know, to find the door handle to get out. And it was so hot, he said, you know, he couldn`t, you know, hardly get to the door handle because it was so hot. And he finally got something to open the door up.
And then when he went in there to -- you know, he finally got out and went to the bedroom to wake his mother up, you know, he said, you know, he said, Di, he said, you know, that`s what he called me, Di -- he said, Di, he said, I didn`t think my mama was going to ever wake up, you know? And so you know, there`s too many, you know, different stories...
(CROSSTALK)
GRACE: What was the other story about the fire, other than the one little Devon told you?
JACQUES: Well, Amanda had told me that -- you know, that it was caught by some covers that had fell on a night-light and that she was the one heard him coughing, and she was the one that got up and kicked the door down and went in there and got Devon. And you know...
GRACE: That`s a drastically different story.
OK. Out to the lines. Lisa in Michigan. Hi, Lisa.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Hi, Nancy. And thank you for what you do.
GRACE: Thank you.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: You`re welcome. I`m wondering, does the mother have any history of mental health problems?
GRACE: Interesting. Taylor Stone with WLMA, I haven`t heard anything about any mental illness.
STONE: No, no reports of mental illness at this particular time, but I`m sure that they`re going to investigate that, as well.
GRACE: To Dr. William Morrone, medical examiner joining us out of Madison Heights, Michigan.
DR. WILLIAM MORRONE, MEDICAL EXAMINER, FORENSIC PATHOLOGIST: Good evening.
GRACE: Welcome, Dr. Morrone. I`ve got two conflicting reports. I`ve got death by smothering and death by strangulation. What`s the difference? When you do an autopsy, how do you tell the difference?
MORRONE: Death by smothering would be pressure from the outside, but it could be pressure covering in a mechanical way. Death by strangulation is pressure to the throat, and strangulation is asphyxia is very specific because there`s a circulatory component that you reduce oxygen going to the brain. Ambient oxygen is 21 percent. Once you reduce that by strangulation to 10 percent, a child or an adult goes unconscious, and less than 8 percent, death will occur.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Deputies responded to a call from Devon`s mother. She told them a man carjacked her, locked her out of the car and killed her son with a pillow. A forensic sketch artist drew this picture based on her description of the suspect. Deputies spoke to Devon`s mother to get more information about the night he died. Questions are now coming from the community. The memorial to Devon Epps includes messages from friends, family and people he never knew, and the message to Devon from loved ones and strangers, Rest in peace.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
GRACE: The 7-year-old boy asphyxiated to death in his mom`s car. She says an assailant carjacked her, smothered the boy and then took off running.
To Elana in Connecticut. Hi, Elana.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Hi, Nancy. I love you. Congratulations. And I miss you over there on Court TV.
GRACE: Thank you. I miss it, too. I love that live trial coverage.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: I know it.
GRACE: I`m not even going to say Phil Spector.
(LAUGHTER)
GRACE: OK, what`s your question?
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: My question is, does anybody know if the mother has a life insurance policy on that child?
GRACE: Excellent question. Jane Velez-Mitchell, what do we know, if anything?
VELEZ-MITCHELL: No idea about that, Nancy. We know that she was a nursing student for a couple of years. We do not know what her source of income was at this time, whether she was employed. There`s no word of that. And we know that her husband was in jail for failing to make custody payments, so obviously, that would provide an inkling that there might have been some money troubles there.
GRACE: Did she have a job, Taylor Stone?
STONE: I`m sorry. Repeat the question?
GRACE: Did she have a job? Did she work?
STONE: That is yet to be determined, as well. I know that she was in, again, the nursing school there in Greenville and -- but they don`t -- they haven`t had a determination of whether she was employed at the time of Devon`s death.
GRACE: Well, that`s interesting. How does she support herself? To Diane Jacques. This is the aunt of Devon Epps. Did she have a job?
JACQUES: Well, she sat (ph) with some other (ph) people, you know, some nights (INAUDIBLE) like, a full-time job, no, ma`am, she didn`t. As far as the life insurance policy, no, ma`am, there was no life insurance policy.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: This young man right here was full of life and full of love. He loved everybody. God will have his vengeance, and he will -- the person that`s guilty will eventually be revealed. And I pray to the fullest that that happens.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
GRACE: A 7-year-old boy is the victim of an unknown, anonymous carjacker. Mom survives.
Out to the lines. Yvonne in Louisiana. Hi, Yvonne.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Hi, Nancy. I love your show.
GRACE: Thank you for calling and watching, and hello to all of our Cajun friends in Louisiana. What`s your question, dear?
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: I was wondering if child protection services has ever been called to this home for...
GRACE: Oh, Yvonne!
(CROSSTALK)
GRACE: You asked the same...
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: ... any other children.
GRACE: You ask the same question I did. Taylor Stone, has DFACS, child services, family and children`s services, been called to the home ever before? Taylor?
STONE: Hi, there. Nancy, no, at this particular determination, we -- they`re investigating that, as well. It`s, again...
GRACE: Wait a minute! This happened in August, August 12, as I recall, at 10:45 PM, which leads me to my next question. Taylor, what was she doing out at 10:45 PM? Not that that`s a crime. That`s not a crime.
STONE: Right.
GRACE: But what`s she doing out with a 7-year-old?
STONE: Well, we are not sure where she was going at that particular time, but apparently, she had the pillow in the back seat of the car because it was late and this child could fall asleep and be comfortable with the pillow. That was what I understood the report to be.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
SUSAN SMITH, CONVICTED OF MURDERING TWO SONS: It just seems so unfair that somebody could take such beautiful children. And I don`t understand. I have put all my trust and faith in the Lord, that he`s taking care of them and that he will bring them home to us.
He put his arms around me, and he told me, "I love you so much, Mama." And he`s always told me he loved me, but never before, not without me telling him first, and that was just -- I am holding on to that so much, because it just means so much.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
GRACE: Yeah, right, holding onto that. That was Susan Smith. Remember her? She claimed she was carjacked by an unidentified black male -- who I recall at the time looked exactly like my trial partner, Herman -- turned out she left her boys buckled in, in a seat belt, a baby seat and seat belts, and pushed them into a lake.
Now, already the A.P. is making comparisons of Susan Smith to this mother, Amanda Regan Smith, age 26, who says she was also carjacked. She wasn`t sexually assaulted; she wasn`t robbed, barely harmed, had a superficial injury to the arm, but she`s not a suspect. Let me remind you of that.
Let`s unleash the lawyers. Joining us tonight, in addition to Holly Hughes prosecutor in Atlanta, joining us, high-profile lawyer out of the Seattle jurisdiction, Anne Bremner. You all know Anne. And Hugo Rodriguez, attorney out of the Atlanta jurisdiction. He`s from Miami, former FBI agent.
To you, Anne Bremner, already the Associated Press making comparisons to Susan Smith. What do you do as her lawyer?
ANNE BREMNER, TRIAL ATTORNEY: The first thing you say is the fact that there`s random acts of violence all over America at all times. Is this a coincidence -- or coinkeedink is the word my grandma likes to use -- that there`s some similar aspects to these cases? And the answer is yes. There`s no evidence here, Nancy, that she committed the crime. The prior fire was never determined to be an arson or an accident, and I know someone who had a lamp catch on fire.
(CROSSTALK)
GRACE: Really, who, who? Who? Who? Who? Who? Can you answer that? Who?
BREMNER: Yes, I can. His last name is Thompson. He`s one of my insurance clients in insurance cases I prosecuted. He had to leave dinner because -- I`m not kidding -- his house was on fire from a lamp, a halogen lamp.
GRACE: A halogen lamp. OK, that`s a lot different from a little night-light and the lamp she had...
(CROSSTALK)
GRACE: ... a halogen lamp can burn a hole through wood?
BREMNER: Nancy, she was asleep during the fire.
GRACE: No, you don`t want to address that, do you, Anne Bremner? Fine.
BREMNER: I just told you I knew someone with a lamp. The second thing...
(CROSSTALK)
GRACE: Halogen.
BREMNER: She could have been a victim. But, finally, Nancy, the drawing looking like the ex-husband, if I thought of a bad guy, I might draw my ex-husband. So does that -- I don`t know -- answer your question?
GRACE: You know what? On so many levels, it answers so many questions.
BREMNER: Nancy, I...
GRACE: Hugo, weigh in.
HUGO RODRIGUEZ, DEFENSE ATTORNEY: The most prudent thing that`s going on here is that law enforcement hasn`t rushed to judgment. There`s an awful lot of unanswered questions.
GRACE: Thank you, Johnnie Cochran.
RODRIGUEZ: No, the forensics must be tremendous. We have all types. They`ve been very close-lipped about what is being disseminated, and there`s going to be a reason for that. We know that they`re forensic at the scene, whether it be the pillow, what was found in the car, what wasn`t found in the car, whether there were any footprints. They know all of that. They`re not revealing it at this time. There must be a reason for it. So let`s wait. I think the prudent thing is that they haven`t rushed to judgment, as some here already have, and let`s see what develops. She may...
GRACE: We tried to reach mom for comment, did not get a comment from her. Out to Dr. Barbara Kirwin, clinical psychologist and author, Dr. Kirwin, interesting that there was no robbery, there was no sex attack. The car -- it was the subject of a carjacking -- was not taken.
BARBARA KIRWIN, CLINICAL PSYCHOLOGIST: Well, we`re calling it a carjacking, but it really doesn`t add up to a carjacking if the car isn`t taken. And I really want to commend you, Nancy and Hugo, for talking about not rushing to judgment. It seems that we`ve got to look at two major things here. We have to look at the forensics, which hopefully the police have under control. And there are so many unanswered history questions that might suggest the motivation of this young woman, if, in fact, she is a person of interest.
GRACE: And right now, again -- she`s not a person of interest, nobody has been ruled in, nobody`s been ruled out -- out to the lines, Manny in California. Hi, Manny.
CALLER: Hi, Nancy. Love your show.
GRACE: Thank you, dear. What`s the question?
CALLER: The question is, did the mom perform CPR?
GRACE: You know, at the time when police arrived, it`s my understanding, Jane Velez-Mitchell, she was on the phone with 911 asking how to perform CPR?
JANE VELEZ-MITCHELL, INVESTIGATIVE REPORTER: That is my understanding, as well. And, once again, a crucial detail, Nancy. While she said that this assailant suffocated her son in the back seat, by the time authorities arrived, the child was on the ground. So it would appear that she took him out of the car to the ground. For what purpose? I don`t know. She`s saying, obviously, that she wanted to perform CPR on the child.
GRACE: Let me get this straight, Jane. The guy jumps in the car at a stop sign. Does he take control of the car at that time, or is he forcing her to drive?
VELEZ-MITCHELL: Well, you know, every description has a slight variation, but my understanding is he gets in the passenger seat, he tells the boy to get into the back seat, or the boy is in the back seat, forces the mother to drive to a nearby wooded area. The mother jumps out or is forced out. Then he locks the car, preventing her from getting back in. That`s when he goes into the back seat, finds the pillow, suffocates the boy. The mother is throwing rocks at the car and frantically, allegedly, trying to get back in the car. She has some cuts and scrapes on her arm, apparently to prove that she had some kind of entanglement, gets back in there, perhaps scuffles with the assailant himself. He takes off on foot fleeing, leaving everything behind, and that`s when she sees that her son is dead in the back seat.
GRACE: To Rhonda in West Virginia. Hi, Rhonda.
CALLER: Hi, Nancy. We love your show. The reason I say we is because I know half my family is out there watching, too.
GRACE: Thank you so much for watching, Rhonda and her family. Thank you. What`s your question, dear?
CALLER: Well, unless we`re also to believe that this guy was conveniently wearing gloves, wouldn`t the police have found fingerprints on the car door or inside the car?
GRACE: My question exactly. And I know that they have been -- they`ve got the car. They`ve been processing the car. And my question is, to you Taylor Stone (ph), what have they learned so far?
STONE: Actually, they have not released that information at this time, but we are very anxiously awaiting the forensic investigation information.
GRACE: You know, Diane Jacques is the aunt of little Devon Epps, age 7 years old, what`s the mom doing now?
DIANE JACQUES, GREAT-AUNT OF MURDERED BOY: I really don`t really have no ideas, because we have no contact with her, you know, whatsoever, you know.
GRACE: Is that her choice or yours?
JACQUES: Probably both.
GRACE: Did you go to the funeral?
JACQUES: Yes, ma`am, I sure did.
GRACE: What was her demeanor at the funeral?
JACQUES: Excuse me?
GRACE: What was her -- how did she look, how did she act at the funeral? Why are you laughing?
JACQUES: No emotion. No emotion at all.
GRACE: Really? Does she have a boyfriend?
JACQUES: That I don`t know. She was more or less to herself, you know. The only thing we seen was Devon, and, you know, she would drop Devon off. And we wouldn`t see her until, you know, she come back and pick him up. And, you know, that was it. But, you know, far as what went on in her life, we have no idea.
GRACE: How long would she leave the boy with you when she would leave him?
JACQUES: Well, my brother kept him about every single weekend. My brother had him from Friday until -- most of the time Monday morning he would take him to school, you know. Well, you know, school was out, you know, at the time. But therefore, the last three to four weeks, his dad, Chad, had him, you know, during the summer, and he stayed at my house, you know, and I got a little grandbaby, and, you know, they played together.
GRACE: Did you ever learn, Diane -- with me is little Devon`s aunt, Diane Jacques -- did you ever learn where she was going that night at 10:45?
JACQUES: I had the same question like everybody else does. What are you doing out, you know, that late, you know? And supposedly, you know, it had been a Sunday night, and that Monday morning he was supposed to be going to school. So you know...
GRACE: Out to the lines, Jane in Michigan. Hi, Jane. Uh-oh, I think I lost Jane. Let me know when she comes back, Liz.
Back to Diane Jacques, the aunt of Devon Epps. So all these questions she didn`t answer?
JACQUES: No. You really couldn`t talk to her, because she was more or less -- I don`t know. You know, we never really did communicate with her, you know, like I said, you know. She would just call and want -- you know, whenever she wanted us to keep Devon or whatever, you know, and that was it. You know, as far as us asking any questions, you know, you know...
GRACE: She didn`t answer. To Anne Bremner, I guess you would argue the demeanor at the funeral is not evidence?
BREMNER: Well, exactly. And the fact is it sounds like there might not have been a great relationship before. And the thing is, you know, shock comes in a lot of forms and so does grief. You`ve heard it in every criminal case, and I`m sure it`s the case here.
GRACE: When we come back, to upscale neighborhood, city, Chicago, the mystery surrounding 28-year-old Nailah Franklin.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
(NEWSBREAK)
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Young, beautiful, successful, outgoing, that`s how friends and family would describe 28-year-old Nailah Franklin, the pharmaceutical rep vanishing in the upscale Chicago area. According to police, Franklin made contact by texting her long-distance boyfriend. Then no one hears from her again.
Adding to the list of growing worries, Franklin misses a very important business meeting, and her cell phone now goes straight to voice mail, and still there`s no sign of 28-year-old Nailah Franklin.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
GRACE: Where is Nailah Franklin? Straight out to Jeff Johnson, investigative reporter with BET. What can you tell me, Jeff? What happened when she went missing?
JEFF JOHNSON, INVESTIGATIVE REPORTER: Well, what we`re hearing is that she went missing on Tuesday; the last time anybody saw her was on Sunday. And as your report just said, the last person -- people talked to her earlier that day, and she texted her boyfriend. But not only do they not know where she is, her car is missing. There`s computers that are missing from her home. So this has really got the police and community in a quandary.
GRACE: OK, that doesn`t even make sense. What you just said, I see an inconsistency, because from my understanding what she texted to her boyfriend was, "I`m on my way to dinner." OK?
JOHNSON: To meet somebody.
GRACE: Now, how would things be stolen from her apartment, I mean, her condo, unless she was going to her condo? Something`s not working right there.
JOHNSON: Clearly something is not working. And what also hasn`t been said yet is that there is someone who had been threatening her. She had gone to the police.
GRACE: Right, I thought it was an ex-boyfriend calling and making threats on her.
JOHNSON: Yes. And she had gone to the police, said that she was threatened, but she also said that she didn`t want protection. So even there there`s some inconsistency. If you`re being threatened but you say you don`t want protection, there`s some inconsistencies there. But her family states that this is unlike her. She`s got a great family who she`s in touch with all the time. So her not only missing this business meeting, but not contacting family goes totally against who she is.
GRACE: She was a pharmaceutical sales rep, right?
JOHNSON: Yes, she was, Eli Lilly.
GRACE: Eli Lilly. Very successful, correct?
JOHNSON: Yes, she was, even begin to dabbling in the real estate game. She owns two properties.
GRACE: To Kathy Chaney, she`s a reporter with the "Chicago Defender" at the press conference today, Kathy, what more can you tell us?
KATHY CHANEY, REPORTER: Basically they say that they`ve gotten a few good leads from the public, but they declined to go any further because they didn`t want to compromise the investigation. They are looking to the video surveillance footage from the apartment building that she lives in and the surrounding police cameras that are in the area. They`re checking her credit cards that are missing, including some corporate credit cards, and also her phone records.
GRACE: To Tom Shamshak, private investigator joining us out of Boston, when you send a text message, I assume that`s from a phone or a BlackBerry, can`t that location be tracked?
TOM SHAMSHAK, PRIVATE INVESTIGATOR, FORMER POLICE CHIEF: Yes, it can, Nancy. When a cell phone is turned on, it`s in standby mode. And every two to three minutes, it`s emitting a ping to a cell tower. And what it`s doing is it`s letting the service provider know that messages, text messages, e-mails, or phone calls can be received.
GRACE: Jeff Johnson, what restaurant was she going to? Was she sighted there, any witnesses?
JOHNSON: Not that I`ve heard at this point. I don`t know if they know what restaurant she was going to.
GRACE: OK, wait a minute. Let me back it up, Jeff. Didn`t she go visit the current boyfriend in Milwaukee that preceding weekend?
JOHNSON: Well, she did, but that obviously has nothing to do with where she was going that night.
GRACE: Whoa, whoa, hold your horses!
JOHNSON: Come on.
GRACE: Jeff, how do we know she even made it back to Chicago? Who saw her?
JOHNSON: Well, like I said, no one had seen her since that Sunday, so we don`t know if she`d made it back. But, again, this is a young woman who talked repeatedly to her family and was close with her family. She talked to her family that day and did not mention that she was out of town.
GRACE: Oh, OK, all right. That makes sense. OK, fine, and then she missed the meeting, and that is what started a lot of suspicion.
JOHNSON: Absolutely.
GRACE: OK, to Teresa in Georgia, hi, Teresa.
CALLER: Hey, Nancy, you are the best!
GRACE: Teresa, you tell the defense lawyers tonight. I`ve got a funny feeling they`re not going to agree with you. What`s your question, dear?
CALLER: OK, my question is this: Do they need a subpoena to get her cell phone records and her place of business records?
GRACE: Well, you know what? Very often those establishments will go ahead, those corporations will hand it over. But to cross your t`s and dot your i`s, you also get subpoenas -- they`re called subpoena duces tecums. You just write them out on a form, easy as pie, and give them to the custodian of records at the cell phone place, at the place of business, right, Anne Bremner?
BREMNER: That`s exactly right. And they`ll reveal a lot of information, Nancy. You`re always right, and I also think you`re the best.
GRACE: OK, you know what? Anne, you`re being deceitful. But I appreciate that.
BREMNER: I am not!
GRACE: Hugo, hey, Hugo, isn`t it best to cover your bases and use the subpoena rather than counting on somebody`s goodwill to give you what you want?
RODRIGUEZ: They`ve probably already done that. And in this case, where it`s an active investigation, they have people and officers in place that could get those warrants readily, and I`m sure they`ve already gotten that. They`ve gotten it.
GRACE: To Lisa in Pennsylvania. Hi, Lisa.
CALLER: Hi, Nancy. How are you?
GRACE: I`m hanging in there.
CALLER: Good. Congratulations again. My question being, a pharmaceutical rep would carry drugs. Could it have been somebody who was looking for drugs?
GRACE: Oh, very good question! You know, Kathy, my brother is a pharmaceutical sales rep, but it`s all birth control pills. Nobody is going to break into the car to get a little ortho novem (ph). So what was her specialty? Could it have been pain pills? Would she have had that in her car, Kathy?
CHANEY: No, the police declined to go further with what type of sales, drugs that she was selling. And they also did not say that she went out of town on business often, so that`s also unknown at this time.
GRACE: To Pat Brown, what do you think, Pat? You`re the profiler.
PAT BROWN, CRIMINAL PROFILER: Well, Nancy, I`m having trouble with the Monday and Tuesday. What happened to Monday and Tuesday? Does anybody know? That`s what I don`t understand. Where was she during those two days? Was she working? Did nobody see her on those two days?
GRACE: We`ll get right back with Jeff Johnson and Kathy Chaney on what happened to the missing 48 hours of Monday and Tuesday.
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GRACE: What a week in America`s courtrooms. Take a look at the stories and, more important, the people who touched our lives.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
GRACE: Did you really think we had heard the last of Orenthal "O.J." Simpson?
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Obviously he killed Ron and Nicole. Obviously he snapped that night, and it seems as if the last 13 years he`s been under a little bit stress and maybe he snapped in Vegas.
GRACE: You know though, Kim, when you say snapped, according to Art Harris and other sources, this had been in the works for three weeks. That`s not a snap. That`s premeditation, if it`s true.
He studied all types of surveillance that they would do this and apparently knew that they were going to do it three weeks ago in a casino. Haven`t these idiots seen "Ocean`s 13"?
But you put a noose up on a tree, where I come from, that is a terroristic threat. That is like a swastika on a synagogue.
Don`t tell me she didn`t know she was pregnant like she told everybody, but that`s not a felony to deny a pregnancy, OK? The felony comes in when you suffocate a newborn baby, leaving it in a trash bag like it`s trash. That`s where I get concerned.
CALLER: Hi, Nancy, congrats on the kids, and we love you.
GRACE: You know what? The minute they heard the theme music tonight for the show, they started kicking like mad.
CALLER: They do that.
GRACE: They do. They`re crazy.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
GRACE: Tonight, let`s stop to remember Army Staff Sergeant Courtney Hollinsworth, just 26, Yonkers, New York, killed, Iraq. Wanted to enlist since boyhood, on a second tour, also served Afghanistan, receiving the Bronze Star and Purple Heart. Loved reading, cooking, family vacations with his aunt and uncle, Joyce and Mark. Leaves behind mom, Hope, widow, Stephanie, sister, Nicole, grandmother, Audrey. Courtney Hollinsworth, American hero.
Thanks to our guests, but most of all to you for inviting us into our homes. A special good night from the New York control room. Good night, Elizabeth. Good night, Brett. See you tomorrow night, 8:00 sharp Eastern. And until then, good night, friend.
END
